Deus Ex Machina
by Grav
Summary: All Dorothy ever wanted was to go home.


AN: Sometime last February or so, my little unspoiled muse decided that there should be a Stargate episode called _Deus Ex Machina_. I tried explaining this to Isa, but since we were in chat, we both missed the other's point and it was only hours later that I realized we had, in fact, been talking about two completely different things.

Therefore:

_Deus Ex Machina_is a literary device wherein at the 11th hour, Data or Geordi (or whomever) creates a machine that saves the day. It is the mechanism by which writers get themselves out of corners. Stargate does this all the time.

_Deus Ex Machina_is Latin for "God in the machine". In the early season, this is B literally /B what Stargate was all about. The Goa'uld were gods by virtue of the naquadah in their blood which allowed them to use the machines to overcome everyone else. And after the events of "In the Line of Duty", Sam has a bit of it in her too.

I haven't seen_Ex Deus Machina_, and this story has nothing to do with it. But I am glad that it happened.

Spoilers: In the Line of Duty, The Tok'ra I, The Tok'ra II, Seth, minor for Out of Mind/Into the Fire

Disclaimer: I can barely afford groceries, let alone the rights to Stargate.

**Deus Ex Machina**

_All Dorothy ever wanted was to go home_.

It had taken her a very long time to figure out why there was a difference. At first, she shrugged it off as the after-effects of having a reptilian symbiote crawl down her throat, take over her body and then die in her central nervous system, but the feeling never went away. It lessened as she became accustomed to it, but whatever it was, it was always nagging at the back of her mind.

She mentioned it to no one, of course, but she was finding herself increasing distracted and she knew it was only a matter of time until Daniel called her on it. When he did, he suggested she ask Teal'c to teach her to meditate. Approximately ten seconds into their first session, Teal'c had told her what was going on.

_"Major Carter," his eyes flashed open and she squinted at him, unsure of what was going on. "You have been changed."_

_"Changed?" she replied. "How?"_

_"There is naquadah in your blood. I can sense it. It must be making you sensitive to the naquadah within me. Or even Cassandra Fraiser. And probably the Stargate itself."_

Then had come the tests. Blood tests, eye tests, ear tests, urine tests, reflex tests, tissue samples and finally, though Sam was suspected mostly for Janet's amusement, pieces of naquadah were hidden around the infirmary and she had to find them without instrumentation.

Teal'c helped her focus. She learned to tell him from the Stargate and the Stargate from any other source of naquadah while they were off-world. It was like she carried her own private homing beacon, and at times that was a very comforting thing.

One day, she had a flash of memory so intense that it almost incapacitated her. In a flash, she had known, known absolutely, that Jolinar had told the truth: that she did fight the Goa'uld. And she did not fight alone.

_There was something about this desert. Something that had happened to Jolinar, but floated just out of Sam's reach. The instant she saw Martouf, it all rushed back to her and Sam vainly tried to block it out._

_Everything was full of memory for her. Hauntingly alien and out of context thoughts flashed at her when she saw oddly shaped rocks or walked down a tunnel she had never been through. And Martouf…_

After Selmak had blended with her father, there was someone she could talk to. Almost. Selmak had known Jolinar better than Jacob knew Samantha, but Selmak had to make her peace with Jacob before she could solve someone else's problems and by the time that was out of the way, the Tok'ra had swept them off to a new world and new assignments and Sam was again alone.

Often, Sam was angry about how useless her new super power was. She could find her way home, yes, but so could any cadet with a compass. Detecting a symbiote's presence had done nothing more than cause momentary alarm before Hathor's agents had rendered them unconscious. And on the current mission, it might get them all killed. There were plenty of other ways Sam could, and did, contribute, but this felt like a disability, a weight on a loose end and she hated loose ends.

_Selmak crumpled and the rush of escapees though tight quarters overwhelmed Sam. Vaguely, she heard shouts of "He's getting away!" and "Stop him!" but she was beyond thinking._

_In the mass of robed and cowled figures, she saw him. Before she knew what had happened, her father's hand device was in her grip. Her blood sang with an alien power and the device hummed to life. She looked upon the false god Seth and her anger consumed her. With her mind and her blood and technology she did not fully understand, she willed the false god to die._

_And then there he was, broken at her feet._

_"Hail Dorothy." _

There's no place like home.

**finis**

gravity.not.included, September 18, 2005


End file.
